What's New

We are pleased to announce the newest addition to the CDI, the Maple Research Collection. In the historic photographs from UVM's Proctor Maple Research Center, researchers can view evidence on sugarbushes, tapping, and sugaring. Significant research on maple is now publicaly available online in the collection's UVM Agricultural Extension Bulletins from 1890-1988.

"In addition, more than 900 Long Trail photos have been made available online from the Special Collection archive at the University of Vermont Library. The archive can be viewed by logging on to cdi.uvm.edu."

The Archivists’ Toolkit is a successful open source software package for archivists, originally developed with grant funding. The author, who formerly worked on the project at a participating institution, examines some of the challenges in making an open source project self-sustaining past grant funding. A consulting group hired by the project recommended that — like many successful open source projects — they rely on a collaborative volunteer community of users and developers. However, the project has had limited success fostering such a community. The author offers specific recommendations for the project going forward to gain market share and develop a collaborative user and development community, with more open governance.

The UVM Libraries’ Center for Digital Initiatives is pleased to announce our newest collection, the Long Trail Photographs, is now available online.
This collection documents the nation’s first long-distance hiking trail and is comprised of over 900 digitized glass lantern slides dating to the 1910s – 1930s.

The images capture the landscapes seen by early hikers, document recreational and maintenance activities on the trail, and provide an historical record of people associated with the trail’s formation.
The photographs were taken by early Long Trail advocates Theron S. Dean and Herbert Wheaton Congdon.

This collection launch coincides with the March 11, 2010 centennial of the Green Mountain Club, the member organization which built and maintains the Long Trail.
The CDI will present the collection to Green Mountain Club members at their Birthday Gala celebration. This GMC event is open to the public, but RSVP soon - space is limited.

Did you know that Vermont produces more maple syrup than any other U.S. state? In 2009 we produced 920 thousand gallons of syrup - more than double that of the runner-up, Maine, which produced 395 thousand.

In New England, sugaring season happens between late February and early April, during the spring thaw. Sap flows most optimally when temperatures drop below freezing at night and rise to around 50 degrees F during the day. If you break a twig off of the end of a maple branch on a sunny spring day, chances are you'll soon see sap dripping out! Consequently, the best 'sugarbushes' consist of stands of sugar maples on south-facing slopes; these trees will have maximum exposure to spring sunlight during the day, and thus will ensure the longest possible sugaring season.

Before New England was settled by colonists, Native Americans were learned sugarmakers; collecting sap in birch bark buckets and heating it in earthenware containers in order to reduce it to syrup. Colonists soon caught on to the practice, eventually modifying sap collection technology through the use of metal buckets and evaporators. They also incorporated domesticated livestock, using draft animals in the transportation of sap from the woods to the sugar house.

Maple syrup and maple sugar are now gourmet food items, but in the 17th and 18th centuries maple sugar was the standard sweetener in New England kitchens!

Today, many maple syrup producers have outfitted their sugarbushes with vast networks of plastic pipelines that carry sap directly from every tree to a central holding tank. This circumvents the activity of outfitting each tree with its own bucket, and hence the involved process of transporting dozens of sap-filled buckets over the snowy forest terrain to the sugar house.

There is, however, still a thriving cottage industry, and many families and small farms still collect sap in buckets and boil it down in small sugar shacks. Some even still use horses or oxen! Despite the scale of our maple syrup industry today, small-scale sugarmaking and community maple festivals continue to represent sugaring season in Vermont.